Thursday, February 21, 2008

Indian Pulses Import to be 3.5 Million Tonnes for 2008

by Phillip Horton

Industry officials said that India will be forced to import 3.5 million tones of pulses for the year 2008/09, because there was a deficit in the winter harvest of pulses. India will have to import the pulses at higher prices from the already competitive pulses market of the world, the industry officials further added. India is the largest consumer, producer and importer of pulses in the world. The country is already fighting against the increasing prices and the government has already prohibited the export of pulses. However, the government has permitted the duty import of the commodity in the country. The president of Pulses Importers’ Association of India, K.C. Bhartiya said that shortage in rain and the cold wave took their toll on the winter harvest of pulses in the country. Given these unavoidable natural causes, the country’s reliance on the import of pulses will definitely increase. He also said that the country will have to import as much as 3.5 million tones of pulses for the next year.

The Indian states of Rajasthan and Madhya Pradesh, which are located in the eastern and central parts of the country respectively, are the biggest producers of pulses in India. These two states have been hit by inadequate rainfall, which has very likely impacted the total yield of pulses, the president said. The Indian agriculture ministry, earlier in the month, had said that the winter yield of pulses will drop by 8.82% to 8.57 million tones for the year 2007/2008, and the earlier figure for the same was 9.40 million tones. According to industry estimates for the year 2007/08, the import of pulses will be about three million tones. The import of pulses for the year 2006/07 was 2.25 million tones. For the year 2007/2008, the pulses yield of India is expected to stand at 14.34 million tones and the earlier pulses output of the country was 14.20 million tones.

An analyst with ICICI Direct, Ravi Bhushan, in this regard, expressed that the government in power will be facing general elections next year and this is the reason why the government may urge the public sector units to import more pulses, so that prices can be kept reasonable for the general public. The countdown to the 2009 elections has begun and as many as ten Indian states will be electing their new assemblies in the current year. The central government in April 2007 had said that it would be importing 1.5 million tonnes of pulses from the agencies run by the states for the year 2007/2008 and before this, private parties were the main pulses importers. President of Grains, Rice and Oilseeds Merchants Association, Sharad Maru, said that the prices of pulses in the international market are already very high, but still domestic prices of pulses will be stable, even if there is import of pulses. The main pulses importers of India include the United States, Australia, Myanmar, and Canada. Among the import of different pulses, yellow peas make for more than half of the overall pulses imported to India.

 

 

 

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